There were a few but I have to say Flip 7 has been a family favorite for a family who doesn’t really like gaming. I am hoping to get them to game more and Flip 7 has helped
It came out last year but I was surprised by Deliverance, we didn't back it, we just picked it off the shelf at FLGS. My husband doesn't usually like co-op anything but he picked it out for the minis and we blazed through the campaign. Now he's totally in for dungeon crawlers, we just picked up Deeprock Galactic 2nd edition and it's also great but that was less of a surprise.
Personally, I watch the top 10 videos because I can identify the next I'll buy based on the taste of content creator I relate to in terms of taste and disdain.
Rise and Fall was my biggest surprise of 2024. I hear almost no one talk about it, but I love that part of the game is creating the world map. Everyone in my family has immediately wanted to play the game again after the first play.
Great video! My own top 100 for board games changes frequently throughout the year as I play new games, so I completely concur that a list like that is merely a snapshot in time. Biggest surprise of the year for me would have to be Beast (though it was published in 2022). I've owned Fury of Dracula for years and enjoyed it, but the game of hide-and-seek vs. when Dracula is found and has to fight has been less appealing to me over the years. I also got Mind MGMT and liked it just fine, but it didn't blow me away; though more plays may change that. Beast, on the other hand, had me hooked from turn one! Some of the others in my group didn't like it as much, but it was also our first game and there was that learning curve to get past. I personally had a tense, fun game playing as the beast: constantly trying to find a way to evade, attack and then escape because it felt like the hunters were always on my heels. They felt like I constantly had the advantage, though, and were trying to determine what options they had to find me. Definitely my biggest surprise (ranked it at number 20 on my list, because it was that much fun), and this was a year that had new-to-me games hit my top 10.
River of Gold was the same for me. I was not expecting much and it’s just so breezy and great to play. Lots of interaction too. However, I find it actually a bit too short, so I’ve now started adding two more building tiles to both stacks in a 3p game, and 3 more in a 4p game.
A couple of small box games: Flip 7, Castle Combo, Faraway, all shocked me with how good they are. Also Windmill Valley shocked me and is amazing and now I'm a fan of Dani Garcia.
For me Starship Interstellar was a huge 2024 surprise. Never heard of the game. Got it on sale for under $40. Ended up being as excited as On Mars while being less complicated and on a larger scale than just a single planet
I will buy War Story: Occupied France based on Matthew's praise. Don't let me down. Loved Middle-Earth Duel and Compile as well so I think I will be safe.
I know this is not the way to interrupt the first question, but Bus surprised me not in that I enjoyed it (I was expecting to enjoy it). Buuuuuut, it made ME surprise me. I knew I was a petty man. But man, I stacked a station full of passengers pretty early on partly because I didn't know how impactful that would be on our game and partly because I was trying to stop/get back at the player in the lead. But it ended up just stranding those poor helpless passengers as most of them were still there by the end of the game and the three of us playing were fighting even more viscously over the limited human resources. But to actually answer the question, I am kind of enthralled with Cthulhu Death May Die. I wanted to try because of all the hype it's received throughout the years but going in I was not sure. My favourite games tend to be like really tight auction/economic games not so much dice chuckers. And the production of it seemed excessive and annoying to set up. But I was pleasantly surprised that finding the right tiles or mixing and matching episodes with elder god is pretty straight forward. And the gameplay is quick, the stakes ramp u[p even quicker, and the humour is understated in the best way. In one of the games I was desperately trying to get one of the characters to "feel the colour" so that I could get my cow to mutate into a six-legged cow as if that was what was going to save me
My three biggest surprises. Castle Combo. Knew nothing about it. I like, not love their other games. Random pick on BGA and now it's my 3rd favorite of the year and I've played it 15 times at least. Let's Go to Japan. When it was on KS I passed right by it because it looked way too light. Plus, pick and pass drafting is very hit or miss for me. Played it and it's in my games I'll never get rid of list. Star Wars Unlimited. I'm not a CCG player and so far I've found Asmodee's model to be kind of a cynical, do the minimum, get the hype payout, and move on with their CCGs. I love Unlimited so much. One of my favorite games of all time. I keep building decks cause I just love it so much.
Oh my word.... I've not played Auzstralia yet and all the expansions or Northlands... So very little time with other projects. But hey next year. Have a great Christmas all the watch it played team and a very drunken board game argument new year.
I buy games, and they'll sit on my shelf for a while before I get to them. Im just playing games I got for Christmas of last year 😂 I just opened Santas Workshop, from last year go play this December and my family is really loving it. I think our familys 😊most played games this year so far have been Lets Go to Japan, Tenpenny Parks and River Valley Glassworks.
People expect the "best of " lists at the end of the year. Some channels will do "top ten of 2024" in July of 2025, which makes logical sense, but absolutely won't get the same number of views. People are stunningly predictable that way.
"at this point in time, in my opinion" is something that should not need to be added, but there are far too many people who don't understand the concept "everyone is entitled to an opinion", and if other people don't agree with their personal opinion, then clearly that alternate opinion can't be valid.... 🙄
Excellent stuff as always Mathew. I didn't buy or play that many games this year so for me it was probably not a good year 🙂. The War stories game looks very interesting. Off topic question: Will you be doing more YesLand videos next year?
What annoys me about top x lists of all-time is any game that moves down 43 to 60 for example for the fact “it didn’t get to the table”. To me that is irrelevant. If you know the game is great because of past experience, and even if you like new games, you can know if the new game stands up to the now old bad game. But just because the old game hasn’t hit the table it’s now not as good. Complete poodoo.
I love the way board games create an emergent narrative, but I don't care for reading the story. You can only read it for the first time once. If the game just relies on the written text it's going to have a very limited shelf life for me, no matter how well written it is.
The realest video out there right now haha such a vibe. Enjoyed this start to finish 😂
Faraway was my pleasant surprise of the year.
Unfortunately, because I watch, "Watch it Played," I'm never surprised when I like a game.
There were a few but I have to say Flip 7 has been a family favorite for a family who doesn’t really like gaming. I am hoping to get them to game more and Flip 7 has helped
It came out last year but I was surprised by Deliverance, we didn't back it, we just picked it off the shelf at FLGS. My husband doesn't usually like co-op anything but he picked it out for the minis and we blazed through the campaign. Now he's totally in for dungeon crawlers, we just picked up Deeprock Galactic 2nd edition and it's also great but that was less of a surprise.
I absolutely LOVE River of Gold. It was my game of GEN CON!!!! Great 'list'
I dont pay enough attention, so Landmarks wasn't on my radar, but Nyobari taught it to us at a con, and I loved it.
Personally, I watch the top 10 videos because I can identify the next I'll buy based on the taste of content creator I relate to in terms of taste and disdain.
Oh yes! It was a very good year for games.
Rise and Fall was my biggest surprise of 2024. I hear almost no one talk about it, but I love that part of the game is creating the world map. Everyone in my family has immediately wanted to play the game again after the first play.
Great video! My own top 100 for board games changes frequently throughout the year as I play new games, so I completely concur that a list like that is merely a snapshot in time.
Biggest surprise of the year for me would have to be Beast (though it was published in 2022). I've owned Fury of Dracula for years and enjoyed it, but the game of hide-and-seek vs. when Dracula is found and has to fight has been less appealing to me over the years. I also got Mind MGMT and liked it just fine, but it didn't blow me away; though more plays may change that.
Beast, on the other hand, had me hooked from turn one! Some of the others in my group didn't like it as much, but it was also our first game and there was that learning curve to get past. I personally had a tense, fun game playing as the beast: constantly trying to find a way to evade, attack and then escape because it felt like the hunters were always on my heels. They felt like I constantly had the advantage, though, and were trying to determine what options they had to find me.
Definitely my biggest surprise (ranked it at number 20 on my list, because it was that much fun), and this was a year that had new-to-me games hit my top 10.
River of Gold was the same for me. I was not expecting much and it’s just so breezy and great to play. Lots of interaction too. However, I find it actually a bit too short, so I’ve now started adding two more building tiles to both stacks in a 3p game, and 3 more in a 4p game.
You don't like cheese?
Completely unhinged to not like cheese.
A couple of small box games: Flip 7, Castle Combo, Faraway, all shocked me with how good they are. Also Windmill Valley shocked me and is amazing and now I'm a fan of Dani Garcia.
Courtisans was a huge hit for my groups.
For me Starship Interstellar was a huge 2024 surprise. Never heard of the game. Got it on sale for under $40. Ended up being as excited as On Mars while being less complicated and on a larger scale than just a single planet
I will buy War Story: Occupied France based on Matthew's praise. Don't let me down. Loved Middle-Earth Duel and Compile as well so I think I will be safe.
Castle Combo & Tower Up were my surprise hits of the year
Who doesn’t like cheese. I can’t trust the judgment of such people. In my opinion. 😂😂😂
I've played so much Vale of Eternity.
I know this is not the way to interrupt the first question, but Bus surprised me not in that I enjoyed it (I was expecting to enjoy it). Buuuuuut, it made ME surprise me. I knew I was a petty man. But man, I stacked a station full of passengers pretty early on partly because I didn't know how impactful that would be on our game and partly because I was trying to stop/get back at the player in the lead. But it ended up just stranding those poor helpless passengers as most of them were still there by the end of the game and the three of us playing were fighting even more viscously over the limited human resources.
But to actually answer the question, I am kind of enthralled with Cthulhu Death May Die. I wanted to try because of all the hype it's received throughout the years but going in I was not sure. My favourite games tend to be like really tight auction/economic games not so much dice chuckers. And the production of it seemed excessive and annoying to set up. But I was pleasantly surprised that finding the right tiles or mixing and matching episodes with elder god is pretty straight forward. And the gameplay is quick, the stakes ramp u[p even quicker, and the humour is understated in the best way. In one of the games I was desperately trying to get one of the characters to "feel the colour" so that I could get my cow to mutate into a six-legged cow as if that was what was going to save me
Castle Combo was my biggest surprise!
My three biggest surprises.
Castle Combo. Knew nothing about it. I like, not love their other games. Random pick on BGA and now it's my 3rd favorite of the year and I've played it 15 times at least.
Let's Go to Japan. When it was on KS I passed right by it because it looked way too light. Plus, pick and pass drafting is very hit or miss for me. Played it and it's in my games I'll never get rid of list.
Star Wars Unlimited. I'm not a CCG player and so far I've found Asmodee's model to be kind of a cynical, do the minimum, get the hype payout, and move on with their CCGs. I love Unlimited so much. One of my favorite games of all time. I keep building decks cause I just love it so much.
Oh my word.... I've not played Auzstralia yet and all the expansions or Northlands... So very little time with other projects. But hey next year. Have a great Christmas all the watch it played team and a very drunken board game argument new year.
Great video! My game of the year was a 1 am game of Match of the Century against Rodney.
That session was incredible and the timing perfect. Loved hanging out and learning that game together!
I buy games, and they'll sit on my shelf for a while before I get to them. Im just playing games I got for Christmas of last year 😂
I just opened Santas Workshop, from last year go play this December and my family is really loving it.
I think our familys 😊most played games this year so far have been Lets Go to Japan, Tenpenny Parks and River Valley Glassworks.
People expect the "best of " lists at the end of the year. Some channels will do "top ten of 2024" in July of 2025, which makes logical sense, but absolutely won't get the same number of views. People are stunningly predictable that way.
"at this point in time, in my opinion" is something that should not need to be added, but there are far too many people who don't understand the concept "everyone is entitled to an opinion", and if other people don't agree with their personal opinion, then clearly that alternate opinion can't be valid.... 🙄
Excellent stuff as always Mathew. I didn't buy or play that many games this year so for me it was probably not a good year 🙂. The War stories game looks very interesting. Off topic question: Will you be doing more YesLand videos next year?
Keep your eyes peeled! -Rodney
My surprise hits were also river of gold and magic number eleven
I thought River of gold was a great game, and I may end up buying it myself, but I'll probably be buying a lot of cheese before that.
What annoys me about top x lists of all-time is any game that moves down 43 to 60 for example for the fact “it didn’t get to the table”. To me that is irrelevant. If you know the game is great because of past experience, and even if you like new games, you can know if the new game stands up to the now old bad game. But just because the old game hasn’t hit the table it’s now not as good. Complete poodoo.
I love the way board games create an emergent narrative, but I don't care for reading the story. You can only read it for the first time once. If the game just relies on the written text it's going to have a very limited shelf life for me, no matter how well written it is.
USAns, where my Santorini?
Don't like cheese!? Unsubscribed... in my opinion